Our River Safari, can you spot the crocodiles?

Day 4: Palo Verde National Park

In the bus again, we descend down the mountain towards Palo for a river safari. But first the bus stops suddenly on the side of the road. Did it break down, like the school bus on our rafting tour? No, the tour guides just saw a full Gauva tree and thought we'd like to taste one. 

Of course we wanted to, and so they picked them and passed them down. I'm not sure if mine was all the way ripe though, because it was not very delicious. Though I'm not an expert on how fresh Guava should taste.

 We also stopped and they picked some coffee beans to pass around and look at. I had no idea they were red and then you squeeze them and the beans shoot out. Literally shoot out, I think I hit someone on accident.

 Beautiful scenery on the way down.

More scenery, as we drove along the coast 

 As we approach the river safari, we make another stop to see the monkeys hanging around. They are howler monkeys, and there howl can be slightly terrifying if you're not expecting it!

As we looked at the monkeys we were surprise attacked by mosquito's. Yes, we probably should have expected that, but we didn't. So we all rushed back to the bus to cover ourselves in repellent. Our repellent completely dissolved the ink on the water bottle wrapper I was holding. I had no idea it was that powerful, but was sure glad not to get eaten. Anyway, below you can see my updating Marc on the monkey's positions after he covered himself in repellent.

 And the river tour begins. At first we mostly saw the bird life. Which was pretty cool, though birds aren't my favorite. Maybe that's due to being pooped on a few too many times.

Thanks to a fellow tour member, Thomas Longfellow, for these and a few of the other wildlife photos.

As we continued to ride down the river, we found it was VERY populated by crocodiles. About every 50 yards it seemed we would see another crocodile slip into the water.

We were informed the crocodile below is one of the largest on the river, but lost part of the top of his snout in a fight with another croc.

 Side note: I now know the difference of alligators and crocodiles first hand. Here are some alligator pictures from a previous post to emphasize the differences.

Doesn't he just look ready to pounce?

Whereas this guy is just soaking in some sun, probably after a delicious meal judging by the size of his belly!

But crocs weren't the only lizard owning this river. Looking into the trees we found lots of iguanas. We learned there were two types on this river, the green iguanas and the black iguanas. So then you might ask, what is this orange iguana doing here? Well, he is looking to mate. We were informed that when the male iguana is ready to mate, he just turns orange and hangs out until the females come to him. Often many females will come to him. So many comments to follow that, but I think I'll just leave it as that. 

Below is the green female iguana looking for an orange friend.

And the orange guy just hanging around waiting. Though he's not as orange, so maybe he already found a friend? (or several friends I guess)

After the tour, we stopped at a local place for some official Costa Rican food. Rice, meat, plantains, salad, and ice cream. It was pretty tasty, even though rice is not one of my top choices to have every meal. 

After lunch we drove some more, to find a little pottery store. The family there has lived there and created pottery for hundreds of years. 

One of the family members showed us how they made the pottery. He passed around some of the clay they use, and that is what Marc is holding, and why I'm smelling my hand I guess. Kind of a weird picture, I know.

Notice all the pottery around. It's a tough choice which one to buy, but we decided on the toucan below.

And then we ended the day by driving to this church. The oldest one in Costa Rica, and a symbol of the beginning of Costa Rica's second history. That of the Spanish take over and the basic emergence of a new culture. 

 Below are some randomly added pictures that I left out of the last blog. We stopped here for lunch on the way to Monteverde, and there were several of these beautiful parrots hanging around.

Another day in paradise, I sure love this guy! :)